Star Wars Galaxies: Editorial: I'm sorry you're leaving ... Can I have your stuff?

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As a long time gamer, one of the things that has always bothered me was people that leave a game and don't clean up after themselves first.

A responsible person will perhaps yell a message that they are leaving and to come to the bank. There they will give away most or all of their stuff to other members of the community that can benefit. If you are some lucky newb...you know there is a god when you have just been given lots of money, perhaps a mount or two, some great weapons, maybe even a house. You truly know you have been in the right place at the right time.

It is the person that doesn't leave this way that has me upset. This is not a new problem. For those of us that played Ultima Online, it was there...We all know of the housing problem that was there and why??? The issue was many of those houses belonged to people that didn't even play the game anymore. EA eventually removed this problem with the housing fix that let the houses "age" and fall if not cared for.

I am currently playing Star Wars Galaxies. There is not only a housing issue in this game...there is a town issue. There is a limit to how many towns can go on any given planet. In a perfect world this is a good idea. The problem arises again when people leave the game and don't clean up. New people coming into the game cant enjoy building a town due to the fact that many of the planets are at the maximum amount of towns. I spent one day running around to many of the player run towns and found many of them had building after building that were all condemned. There should be some way that these buildings and towns could be adopted by new players. There should be some way that a new player could come in with a group and become the new mayor and have an option then to remove buildings or become the new owners. If the old members of the town that are gone and didn't play anymore didn't count in a vote for mayor, this could happen now. A new group could come in and hold an election. Have a new mayor and be off and going with a ready built town. They cold either pay the back taxes on the buildings or tear them down and rebuild. Problem fixed.

I would urge you as a player, if you know you're done with a game and canceling your account, clean up after yourself. Make some player happy. It feels great.